well known or unkown?!

As my knowledge about english expressions is very limited, I'd like, to invent a place to get help for things, which are difficult to understand.

Years ago, I had an englisch colleague, he was able, to explain a lot of things.
Since then I know, that "mad as a hatter" means to be a little silly, because the hatters used mercury, what wasn't good for their brain.
"Took off to the land of nod" describes, that s.o. falls asleep.

Now I found a song titled "Gun Street Girl" - ending with the line"I'll never kiss a gun street girl again"

What or who is a "gun street girl"

Does anyone know?

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Ah yes, good idea. English sayings don't always make sense - and the same goes for German ones. Only since I've started to use English so much I have realised how many we have that *can't* be translated. Sometimes we know what is meant, but not really where it came from and what it really was saying. So why should English be different?

My first idea to your question was an armed girl from a street gang, but I have never heard the expression before, so I went to Leo. The dictionary itself doesn't know that, either, but in the forum I found some explanation:

Zitat:

Ein "gun girl" - so habe ich einmal einem Krimi entnommen - war (wohl in der Prohibitionszeit) eine Begleiterin, der ein Killer nach dem Schuss seine Waffe zusteckte (und die damit unauffÃ¤llig verschwand, damit er nicht "mit dem rauchenden Colt" erwischt werden konnte.

Thanks.
I tried to get something out of the context, but it is a song by Tom Waits.
Wonderfull in every view. But also strange.
I can sing along, but I don't understand what he's singing about.
*gg*

ausgejault Anmeldedatum: 24.10.2004 Beiträge: 1681

Great idea, Google!
This thread could turn into a wonderful array of incredible things said...
I have never heard gun street girl before, either, but in my current surroundings I have people from all nativities (Australians, Americans, English and Canadians), so I'll ask around if they have!
The killer explanation sounds like a good one.

Uh, Google - please turn you "took of" into a "took off", so it makes sense :o)

All good songs should have indiscernable lyrics... Oh man, please help me against this "ear worm" now!! (sings "Gun Street girl" to "Uptown Girl" melody.. aaaahhhhhh)

Ok, here's a little saying or rather, a poem for you, very easy to understand:

Nighty-night
sleep tight
don't let the bed bugs bite
(+ my friend Gina's addition)
and if they do
hit them with a shoe!!

:o) Which we do here regularly and with conviction, as there are so many bed bugs, or rather under-bed bugs...

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Lyrics are not always making much sense, no?

But I know how you feel. In my contacts with Kel, I have learned that some words have not exactly the meaning they are supposed to have here, or at least the meaning the ones I heard it from put into it. And some sayings we had to expaining the meaning of to be understandable. Not to mention all the times when I was asking her about meanings or correct spelling when I was wondering (as only the other day about that annoying "half an year", which for all I learned should be "half a year"). It's always great to have someone to turn to with that stuff.

ausgejault Anmeldedatum: 24.10.2004 Beiträge: 1681

Half an year? What new devilry is this?

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

I keep seeing that on the internet in about 75% of the cases, but once I learned that a is used before consonants and an before vocals, so I finally asked Kel if that's a special case, but she told me I was right, it should be half a year. Oh well, considering what some of these people make in the way of spelling mistakes, I shouldn't be surprised at all.

ausgejault Anmeldedatum: 24.10.2004 Beiträge: 1681

Ah, good. It sounded like you had come across some weird rule at first... Wouldn't surprise me, with English being such an impossible language!
In the first chapter of HP the students and me came across 5 different ways of pronouncing the vowel combination "ea":
- head
- bear
- fear
- learn
- realise
No wonder most of the students find Thai easier to learn...[/list]

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Yeah, that's what Dernie said - there's no logic whatsoever in English pronouncation. Any questions why I never got that really right back in my school days and we finally gave up on that?

Weird thing!
I also know this with "a" and "an".
"Within an year" does sound wrong!

Lyrics are often without sense or difficult to understand.
But more often it is my problem, to hear the words right.
For years I wondered about the line "hiding from the solenoid sky"
As I know solenoid valves - but this makes absolutly no sense.
Meanwhile I think, that it should be "hiding from the sun and the sky", but still it is not clearly to hear for me.
:-)

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Solenoid sky? *scratches head* Solenoid seems to be a technical synonyme to lodestone / magnet, but that doesn't really help. Since when is the sky magnetic? No wonder you had problems to understand when it doesn't make any sense. I wonder if DD or one of the Aussies can help here.

While we are at it - I keep seeing sentences where people don't say 'you should have thought about that', but 'you should of thought about that' - is that some form of dialect or what? I find it quite annoying, to be honest.

ausgejault Anmeldedatum: 24.10.2004 Beiträge: 1681

No Kitty, it is an unfortunately wide-spread written adaptation of poor teenage speech. Lots of young people in England wrote like that when I worked there. They say "would've" which sounds like "wouldof" and then they start writing that, whether it makes sense or not. It is very, very frightening.

Hey Google, with those things you should ring ffn (or was it NDR2?) and tell them about your "Oma fiel ins Klo"-Song, which is quite a funny feature for people who hear something different. The original for "Oma fiel ins Klo" is "all my feelings grow (or glow, not sure myself now, ha), it's really funny sometimes. There's also a book about this phenomenon: "Der weisse Neger Wumbaba" (original: "Der weisse Nebel wunderbar").

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Oh thanks, that explains it, even if it certainly makes no sense whatsoever. (To me not even the pronouncation - 've = of?? I seem to remember that "have" sounds like "haf"?)

Yes, it is frightening, but look through some websites and you will realise that is only one of many, many problems the younger people nowadays seem to have with their own language. There are so many words who are sounding similar, mean something completely different, but people keep mixing them up because they don't even know what they mean:
- they're / their / there
- we're / were / where
- whether / weather
- aloud / allowed
- though / thought / through

Then there are these where I am not certain how much is pronouncation and how much plain stupidity:
- draft / draught
- access / except
- abolish / admonish (ok, that was only one, so probably stupidity)
- definitely / definat(e)ly / defiantly

And from the fanfics I've read or tried to read I have to say that far more than half the fans can't even spell Dolores Umbridge's name correct - most write her Delores or, worse, Deloris. Kreacher is mostly Kreature ... ok, as far as I know, in the later case the pronouncation is quite similar, but I asked Kel about Delores, and she assured me the pronouncation can't be the reason for that nonsense. I really wish people would at least bother to look these names up before using them. And the same could be said of some spells - Imperius isn't Imperious, for Merlin's sake! And it's Fidelius Charm, not Fidelis, Fidelus, Fidelitus or whatever.
Really, I think sometimes that 90-95% of the authors on certain websites would never be allowed to post on my favourite LotR archive - not without a beta taking them completely apart. It's really sad how bad that spelling has gotten lately.

Ha, I remember 'Der weiÃŸe Neger Wumbaba'! There's a second book now, too. That was fun to read.

*gg* I own a copy of "Wumbaba" - nice to read, but not very much content. Not long ago there was a show on TV (RTL2, I think) where the played parts of songs, told, what people understand, replayed them - now one was able to hear the wrong lyrics, also. And of course they told the original lyrics after that!
Was quite funny.

But not "quiet" funny.
A mistake, I always like to do.
Sometimes I'm lucky and my ortographic feeling tells me to ask Leo or any other page, sometimes, it doesn't.

The problem of writen slang is also a problem in Germany.
As many user do not know the difference between "wider" and "wieder" also "dem/den/denn/wem/wen/wenn" are not easy for some people.
The "Deutschrussen" inventet the new word "ScheiÃŸendreck" (often enough with "ss"!) and instead of "ein/eine/einem/einen" you can hear and read "nen":
"Ich habe nen Auto gekauft" "Hast du nen Zigarette fÃ¼r mich"

BÃ¼cherwurm Anmeldedatum: 04.10.2004 Beiträge: 9675 Wohnort: bei Mrs. Figg

Ah yes, quite/quiet is another one people keep confusing. It's not only you, Google, there are hundreds of others out there.

*grin* wider and wieder are not easy for some, aren't they? I always thought it easy - wider is when you are against something (widersprechen, Widerstand, widerspenstig) and wieder means 'again' - wiederholen, wiedersehen ...

A fanfic just gave me a mnemonic for the difference between stalactites and stalagmites. Never could remember that, but one explained it as c = ceiling and g = ground, and now I finally could memorise what's what.

Are it only the German-Russians who use 'nen'? To me it seemed more the usual teenage slang, but I could be mistaken there.